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The Headlines
MARKET MACHINATIONS. With Frieze on tap next week, and the major New York auctions about a month away, the art market is humming. At those New York sales, 130 works from the collection of the legendary TV producer Douglas S. Cramer (Dynasty, The Love Boat) will be offered at Sotheby’s, where they are expected to bring in $30 million, ARTnews reports. Meanwhile, 40 dealers from around the world have come together to form an International Galleries Alliance, which has “embryonic plans for everything from summits to an online sales platform,” Melanie Gerlis reports in the Financial Times. To start, it plans to grow to 300 invited members. And the exhibitor list is out for the next Art Basel Miami Beach, which arrives in December, after a two-year pandemic-induced gap; there are 43 first-time participants. ARTnews has the details.
Related Articles
HISTORY’S MYSTERIES. Some scholars believe that a painting of Jesus crowned with thorns, recently estimated to fetch just $1,800 at auction, is, in fact, a Caravaggio, WSJ Magazine reports. If the work is authenticated, it could be worth many millions. Meanwhile, archaeologists in Sweden are trying to learn more about the apparent murder of 26 people on an island in the country some 1,500 years ago. National Geographic has the story. And at Amsterdam’s Van Gogh Museum, a show of never-before-exhibited
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The Digest
The Polish-Romani artist and activist Małgorzata Mirga-Tas has been tapped to represent Poland at the next Venice Biennale, which arrives in April. The pavilion is helmed by the Zachęta National Gallery of Art in Warsaw; art historian Wojciech Szymański and curator Joanna Warsza are co-curating. [Artforum]
A new digital tool named the Aerial Archaeological Mapping Explorer allows users to fly over England (virtually, of course), taking in “previously unknown details about local landscapes, including prehistoric hill forts, Roman settlements, and Cold War military installations,” Harriet Sherwood reports. [The Guardian]
BlackRock chairman and CEO Larry Fink, who is a board member at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, got the profile treatment from Robin Wigglesworth. Fink’s art activities are, alas, not covered, but his path to leading a firm that manages nearly $10 trillion in asset is charted in great detail. [FT Magazine]
An art exhibition has opened in the North Korean capital city of Pyongyang that is tied to the 30th anniversary of the publication of the art theory of Kim Jong-il, who was then the Supreme Leader of the country, and who is the father of its current ruler, Kim Jong-un. [Yonhap]
A few new clues about what artist Anicka Yi has in store for her soon-to-open Tate Modern show. “I’ve essentially built a world in the Turbine Hall,” she says in a new profile. “It’s more than an art project, really. It’s something else altogether.” [British Vogue]
In the mood to do a little cooking this weekend? Why not try this tantalizing recipe for jollof rice from artist Ibrahim Mahama? [Wallpaper]
The Kicker
DISASTER AVERTED. This week, Pace is opening a grand new 11,000-square-foot gallery in London, and so its president and CEO, Marc Glimcher, chatted with the Financial Times about his plans for the business and his life up to this point. One lesser-known chapter: Glimcher studied molecular biology at Johns Hopkins University , with an emphasis on immunology and vaccine design. “It would have been great,” he said, “but, spoiler alert, I did not finish. In fact, I almost blew up the top floor of the research center, though very little radiation actually escaped.” [FT]